


The Road Not Taken

by Asynca



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Canon Universe, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, F/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Slow Burn, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-24
Updated: 2019-09-24
Packaged: 2020-10-27 10:16:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,182
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20758745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asynca/pseuds/Asynca
Summary: Alleria is struggling with her return to Azeroth. Jaina is struggling to believe happiness can ever be anything but a herald of future loss. Neither of them really know how to start the process of recovery - at least, not without help. Slowburn F/F, starts off canon-compliant.





	The Road Not Taken

Alleria had spent many hundreds of years imagining her return to Azeroth.

Trapped in a cell on the Xenedar, she could do little else but escape the horror of Xe'ra's 're-education' by drifting peacefully away from the torment and returning in her mind to the places she loved. It became a comfort, in the end. Xe'ra would present herself each morning and Alleria would accept that, knowing that for a time her mind would be somewhere else. Somewhere familiar, immersed in familiar sounds and familiar scents, and surrounded by people she loved. 

So many things she had not expected to miss were so painfully absent to her here on Argus: the soft grass bending under her boots. The feeling of waking up with the gentle morning sun falling on her. The rustling of the trees, the birds, the sound of the sea lapping at the shore by her family home.

Then there were other, more personal memories: her sisters—how she missed them! She never thought she’d miss their constant arguments, but she would have endured decades of them to the torment and isolation she had here. She missed listening to them bickering one moment and then seeing them arm-in-arm and the best of friends the next. She missed how alike they had grown to be. Then there were her other ‘sisters’, too, the rangers: she remembered the camaraderie, gently affectionate practical jokes like switching someone’s helmet out with a smaller one, or moving the laces in someone’s boots so one side was inexplicably suddenly longer than the other. How they’d save their winter pears for because they knew she loved them, and how all of them had embraced her and comforted her when she’d heard news of her brother’s death.

And, of course, Arator. Her Arator, the tiny, chubby little baby in her arms. How perfect all his little fingers were; how his big, faintly glowing eyes watched her with such peace and wonder. How it felt to have a child at her breast and his father behind her, whispering how much he loved her in one of her long ears. It was an image that had comforted her every long night for 1000 years.

It was all these memories and all these fantasies about her return that sustained her.

When she’d stepped out of the crash site of her prison and looked up to see a new ship in the sky, her heart had lifted out of her chest and she’d simply burst with how much she wanted to shout his name—all their names! She’d scrambled through the rubble, feeling her eyes welling with tears. _I’m coming home at last_! her brain sang as she’d clambered across the broken hellscape towards it. _I’m coming home_!

Home.

Back here, the grass still bent under her boots, and the gentle sun still woke her in the morning. But there were no sisters bickering in the next room. None of the rangers, now ‘blood elves’ would have very much to do with her. Arator, now a grown man, greeted her stiffly as he would an honoured stranger, and wrote her long and formal letters that one might send one’s great-great aunt. Hampered by the opposition between her newfound void powers and his Light worship, Turalyon couldn’t get close enough to her to whisper in her ear anymore—not that he’d be inclined to, these days.

A thousand years of struggle, torture and isolation, and this was her homecoming: a tired old ship sailing into rainy Stormwind Harbour, greeted by a young king she didn’t know. It was dark, cold and grey, with none of the vibrant colour and poignant emotion she’d spent so many years finding solace in.

Mercifully, King Anduin pulled her aside almost straight away and, apologising, asked if she’d be prepared to lend some of her strategic know-how to aid conflict they were facing on the Kul Tiran isles.

So it was here, confined to her tiny cabin below deck, moored right outside the assembly barracks for all of the Alliance that she found herself each night. Alone except for the whispers of the void. _Well, _she reflected as she stared up at the ceiling of her new cell,_ it’s certainly an improvement on imprisonment and torture_. Even as she said that, she could feel herself slipping back into that place, back into the place that imagined her wondrous homecoming, all the beautiful places she’d visit and all the people she loved gathered around her. The fantasy felt like a warm blanket wrapped around her, and she slipped into it like an old shoe as she drifted off to sleep.

In the morning, she had to face the truth in the harsh light of day: her homecoming was over.

Turalyon was gone—having accepted a missive to leave for Arathi without so much as a goodbye. Arator and Vereesa lived in Dalaran, a place Alleria couldn’t possibly be more ill-suited to inhabiting than if it was underwater. There were no rangers for her to join anymore; just the main Alliance infantry as an archer. Her tracking skills were useless here. The incredible knowledge and skills she honed from hundreds of years hunting and slaying demons was useless here. There was only her void powers that differentiated her, now. Even those, Umbric, with the practiced experienced of a thousand years being a magister, had made advances in weeks that had taken her 500 years.

Anduin’s grand plan for her as a researcher/strategist couldn’t have been more token. It was a kindness, she could see that, but her real job was to stand somewhere prominent and be _the _Alleria Windrunner, the elf who’d survived the twisting nether and helped defeat the Legion. It gave the troops hope to see a storybook hero standing amongst them, even if that’s all she was doing: a lot of standing and a lot of waiting.

She had made her opinions on various strategic discussions heard initially—but more and more she found herself hanging back, listening as if through a long and empty tunnel to people discussing the minutia of battle. Her mind slipped away during those meetings—back to Eversong Woods and rolling hills of Quel’Thalas. 

This morning, though, there was a new face at the table.

Lady Jaina Proudmoore nodded politely at Alleria and greeted them all, launching right into a report of Horde spotted in Kul Tiras. They’d sent some Thornspeakers to scout the breadth of the incursion, but Jaina was seeking advice on how to manage the trespassers and what exactly their presence meant.

Wyrmbane drummed his fingers on the table. “It’s possible they’re just keeping an eye on us.”

Shaw wasn’t having any of it. “They have spies for that, and so do we.”

“Surely they can’t be thinking of invading?” Jaina suggested eventually. “Their navy is—amateur, at best. We’d crush them, they must know that.”

“Perhaps they want us to _think _they’re invading, then?” Wyrmbane asked. “So we don’t send our full navy to Zandalar?”

The conversation continued around their motives; Alleria listened. She had little to add, without much knowledge of the modern Horde. Instead, she’d been watching the side of Jaina’s face, still surprised by how quickly she’d aged; human aging seemed so sudden, like a cut flower that wilted in a week. Not that Jaina appeared like a wilted flower, exactly, but the subtle crow’s feet on the corners of her eyes were new, and her face had lost its youthful chubbiness and was now drawn and slender. It was probably the hair that made her appear so much older, Alleria thought. The silver-white of it drained the colour from her skin.

It wasn’t until all faces were turned towards her that she realised that someone had asked her what she thought Sylvanas was up to.

A faint blush rose to her cheeks. “I’m the last person to comment on my sister’s plans,” she said, and then watched everyone around the table slump in disappointment. “Truly, I don’t know her anymore.”

Jaina wasn’t convinced. “Surely she can’t have changed that much? At least in how she approaches battles? Is there anything at all you can tell us to expect from her?”

Alleria exhaled. How had Sylvanas been on the field? “Well, she’s very clever,” she decided, “And very patient. She prefers to line up ducks and let the enemy make mistakes. If anything, we’re probably best to ignore her bait and continue as planned.”

They considered that. Jaina pursed her lips. “So it’s bait, you think? These Horde nibbling at our edges?”

“There are a hundred of them and thousands of us,” Alleria pointed out. “And they’re not hiding. There’s really only three things they could be: a distraction from whatever Sylvanas is _really _planning, bait to keep more boots on soil that we’d otherwise be sending to Zandalar, or perhaps even a pretty retaliation because we landed in their shores first. In any case, I suggest we ignore them for now. Local hamlet militia seems to be handling them well enough. It will become clear in time why they’re here, we don’t need to waste any more of our thinly stretched resources investigating them for the time being.”

“But they’re _stealing _our azerite for themselves,” Jaina reminded her. “Are you suggesting we just let them?”

“Yes,” Alleria said easily. “For now, at least. Doing anything else would almost certainly be playing into my sister’s hands.”

Jaina’s delicate face was pulled into a deep frown, and she looked for a moment like she was going to protest. In the end, her frown eased somewhat. “Well, you do know her best,” she conceded, but looked deeply uncomfortable as they moved on to further business.

After the war table was over, Jaina hung back a little from the others as their conversation moved to lighter topics.

_She probably wants to press me more about Sylvanas_, Alleria figured, sighing internally as Jaina rounded the table and approached her.

Jaina was smiling, though. “I hope I didn’t sound too dismissive before,” she said much more warmly than Alleria had expected. “It’s good having the benefit of your insight on her.”

Alleria eyed that smile with suspicion. Why was she being so friendly? “If it’s insight on Sylvanas you want more of, perhaps we should invite my other sister? She’s young, but she’s certainly had more to do with Sylvanas in the last 20 years than I have.”

Jaina’s smile deepened. “I considered that,” she admitted. “But Vereesa doesn’t easily manage conversations about Sylvanas, does she? I didn’t want to trouble her unless it was completely necessary.”

There was something about the way Jaina spoke of her that caught Alleria off-guard. It took her a moment to realise why. “Oh—you know her, don’t you? My sister?”

Jaina nodded. “I do! We were quite close for a time—not a happy time, I might add. But I would have been a great deal unhappier if not for her. I’m very grateful for that.”

Alleria’s eyebrows rose. It was an interesting thought, Vereesa and Jaina as friends. “I’m glad to hear of it.”

Jaina was still standing before her, as if there was more to be said. When Alleria didn’t say any of it, Jaina’s smile thinned.

Alleria’s throat tightened at that; she felt stuck in place as if she were anchored to the boat with chains. She knew she should speak—but what should she say? What was Jaina expecting of her? Try as she might, she couldn’t forge through the cottonwool in her head. She felt as if she was watching herself from outside her body, as frozen in time as she’d been in Argus.

Jaina opened her mouth once, closed it for a moment, and then tried again. “Anyway, I can see I’m intruding on your time, so I’ll take up no more of it.” She gave Alleria the same respectful nod Alleria had given her. “Thank you once again for your insight at the war table and your presence in Kul Tiras.”

As Jaina turned away, Alleria had an awful sense that she’d failed something and disappointed Jaina. She watched Jaina cross the distance between the war table and her Alliance colleagues in a few long strides, walking with them onto the docks and then chatting with them as they made for the barracks.

Still stuck in those chains, Alleria stood and watched them leave.

Jaina’s last words haunted her for several days. ‘I can see I’m intruding on your time’.

In bed at night, Alleria imagined whole elaborate scenes of how she should have replied. _‘_You really aren’t intruding’, she decided she should have said, perhaps with the same warm smile Jaina had directed her. ‘Unless you consider it intruding to interrupt my very busy schedule of standing on deck and looking heroic for the soldiers’. Jaina would return her smile, she thought, or perhaps even chuckle. She certainly wouldn’t look uncomfortable, apologise and leave like she had done. Alleria couldn’t shake that last image of Jaina’s discomfort from her mind.

What on earth was wrong with her these days? She’d never been a social butterfly like her sisters, but she’d also never been like _this. _It was as if those years spent trapped in a dungeon had completely eroded her ability to even have a simple conversation with people; everything felt hard, as if she was speaking through molasses. The worst thing, though, was the gulf that had appeared between her and everyone else; she felt different, separate from them. She even felt it with Turalyon.

There was no one else to speak with, though. And at least she knew he loved her, despite their differences.

After the soldiers had retired from the docks, she tore a rift open to Stromgarde Keep. It would be good to see Turalyon again. Spending a few hours in the company of someone who knew and loved her would do her good.

Stromgarde had fallen halfway to ruin since her last visit there, but the layout was the same and the commander’s quarters were where they had always been. The guards didn’t stop her as she rushed past them, and when Turalyon, who had been hunched over his desk learning heavily on his thick arms, looked up and spotted her arrival—

His golden eyes lit up, and he stood, smoothing a lock of his hair (now not so golden) off his face. The smile on his face was like an oasis in an endless desert.

For the briefest of moments, Alleria entertained the thought of rushing up to him and throwing herself into his arms and having them squeeze the breath out of her, ignoring the pain it would cause her to touch a worshipper of the Light, ignoring how it would sear her flesh, and just imagining how it used to be. How they _used _to hold each other, and how loved, and valued and _seen_ and—

His smile abruptly fell, tearing her away from her fantasy. His brow lowered, and his stance changed. He was guarded. “Alleria.”

_Now is your chance_, the void whispers told Alleria. _He’s alone. We can kill him. If you kill the guards who saw you arrive no one will see, and no one will—_ “Turalyon,” she greeted him, ignoring the voices at her ears. “It’s so good to see you.”

A smile wavered at his lips. He _wanted _to smile, but he couldn’t. “And you, my love,” he said as Alleria stopped before him. Far enough away so that neither of them hurt each other. He paused before he spoke again, struggling with what he wanted to ask. “How did you get here?” It was a loaded question.

_Kill him! Kill him! Kill—_“A portal,” she lied, knowing how much he hated it when she used her void powers. Well, a void rift _was _technically a type of portal…

Unfortunately, he didn’t buy it at all. “There are no mages porting people at present, Alleria.”

From deep within her, she sighed. Couldn’t he just be happy to see her? Couldn’t he just leave it and spend some time with his girlfriend of a thousand years?

Predictably, because this was Turalyon, he couldn’t. Heartbreak was audible in his voice as he asked her tenderly, “Why are you lying to me, my love?”

Her stomach clenched. “Because you’ve made it abundantly clear how much you hate the truth.”

His mouth turned. “I am a servant of the Truth,” he told her. “A Truth you’ve clearly turned your heart away fro—”

“Turalyon, _please_,” she said, throwing her hands out in defeat. “I came to visit you. Can we not just appreciate each other’s company for the brief time we’re able to seek it?”

“I would find it much easier to appreciate your company if you didn’t take every opportunity to—”

“_Turalyon_.” She would have taken his hands if she could have. She wasn’t wearing gloves, though, so she couldn’t. Not without hurting him. “I’m not listening to _my _whispers. Could you not ignore yours for even a moment?”

They faced off for a moment as he bit his lip against whatever else he desperately wanted to say to her. In the end, his shoulders slumped as his resolve visibly crumbled. “Very well,” he said, roughly smoothing back his grey hair with a frustrated sweep of his hand. “It’s time I ate something, anyway. I’ll call for some supper.”

The food the staff fetched for them wasn’t exactly gourmet—in fact the cheese had hard dry bits and the white was slightly sour—but it was better than rations on _The Wind’s Redemption_. She endured it for the company; even if her company was simply recounting boring, mundane details of their assault on Arathi to rescue it from the clutches of the Horde. “_Liadrin_ is heading the Horde defence,” he told her. “I must say, if I thought the Twisting Nether was another universe, I’m not sure where we are now. She was one of the finest priests in Lordaeron.”

“Well, so were you,” Alleria pointed out. “And now look at you.” There was a twinkle in her eye.

She had meant it to be a playful jibe about how much of a warrior he now was, but she must have misjudged her delivery, because he smarted like she’d kicked him. “Yes, look at me,” he said, leaning back in his chair away from him. “Now I can’t even save the woman I love most.”

_Kill him! Lean across the table and wrap your fingers around his neck and—_ “I don’t need saving, Turalyon,” she said, suddenly feeling every year of her age. “I just need you to understand that the void isn’t what you—”

“Why are you here?”

That abrupt turnabout caught her by surprise. “To see you, of course.”

He shook his head. “But why now? You’ve done well enough without me for months. Something happened. What was it?”

She made a face; there certainly were drawbacks to spending hundreds of years with someone. Sometimes it would be easier if he didn’t know her so very well. “Nothing happened,” she began, wondering if trying to hide it was pointless. “Nothing of consequence, anyway. I just wanted to—”

“Alleria.”

She watched him for a moment, pushing a lump of hard cheese across her plate with a fingertip. There was no reason to hide what was upsetting her, so why did she feel like she should?

“Alleria?” This time, his tone softened. She could see genuine concern on his face, curse him.

It was what decided her on being candid. She took a breath. “Don’t you feel—like everything is surreal?” she asked. He watched her; she couldn’t read him. “I can’t even really explain what it is, but it’s as it—well, it’s as if nothing is real. Like I’m in some sort of bad dream.” She looked up from her plate at him.

He had that gentle, compassionate look on his face—the one that had drawn her in initially. Once, he might have hugged her. He couldn’t now; still, she could see his fingers tapping nervously on the table, and his eyes darting down towards her hand. He wanted to take it. “I think it’s to be expected you’d feel that way.”

That seemed hopeful. “It is?”

He nodded. “Of course, my love, after what you’ve been through. Of course you feel like you don’t belong.”

She exhaled at length in a faint smile. That was exactly how she felt. She took another breath to tell him that, but he continued.

“I felt the same way, until I accepted the Light into my heart. Alleria,” he reached a hand across the table to her, “you will feel so much better once you’re free of the evil that’s taken root inside you.”

The hopeful breath she’d just taken seeped out of her.

“I’ve spoken to the king,” Turalyon told her, with the same passion he always had about these matters. “King Anduin believes, as I do, that there is a Naaru in the Netherlight Temple who could cleanse your heart of that dark, evil void that’s possessed your body and soul. You’ll be pure again, and you’ll be able to feel all the beautiful emotions the Light brings to a person: peace, love,” he paused, “a sense of purpose and belonging.”

_KILL HIM! KILL HIM! KILL HI— _“Suddenly, I’m no longer hungry.” Her voice sounded flat, tired. She stood.

He did, as well. “Alleria, please listen to me, I know the evil whispers inside you are telling you not to—”

“There’s no evil inside me, Turalyon. And I find it just as easy to ignore the ‘whispers’ as I do your incessant nagging.”

He still had that accursed _compassion _on his face. “If that is so, why are you feeling so lost?”

She was too tired for this. “I don’t know, perhaps because I was thrown back into a world where my people are dead, and those who are not dead are in the Horde, my son doesn’t know me and my sisters are at terrible odds?” she asked, too disappointed with how her visit had turned out to care if she lost her temper. “The Farstriders don’t exist anymore, the Alliance has little use for me and the man who is essentially my husband refuses to accept who I now am?”

On that point, he looked steadfast. “Of course, I refuse it. You chose a dark path, Alleria,” he told her. “You could make a different choice, the right choice, at any time. I would welcome you back into my arms in a heartbeat if you repented—you are my heart, my love. It’s so painful for me to see you renounce the Light. The Light who once protected you, and shielded you, and—”

She was sick of his nonsense. “I am who I am, Turalyon. Take me or leave me as I am.”

He set his chin with that same irritating righteousness she’d always struggled to tolerate. “This isn’t who you are. _I _know who you are.”

“Do you?” she asked him, no longer caring to guard her tone.

“I do!” he said, raising his voice. There was no anger in it. “And it’s not _this_! It’s a woman who knew exactly who she was and exactly what her purpose was. Now, look at you: you’re lost. You’re suffering. You can’t feel the love I have for you. You needn’t suffer! In the Light, no one suffers!”

She could scarcely believe what she was hearing. “’In the Light no one suffers?’” she repeated, barely able to get the words out. Did he honestly believe that, even after knowing what she’d endured? “In the Light no one—don’t you know what Xe’ra _did to me_?” Even to her own ears, she could hear her voice snap like a cut guitar string. “I was _tortured, _Turalyon! Hour upon hour, day upon day, for hundreds of years, by someone who said she _loved _me and didn’t want me to _suffer_, and who insisted my existence would ruin everything unless I was pure! So if you really think that you’ll be able to save me _through love _or whatever self-indulgent boyhood fantasy you have about my _hallowed salvation_, you are sorely mistaken!”

He recoiled as if she’d slapped him, and spent a moment considering her. “I love you,” he said quietly. “I believe in you, Alleria. I know you’ll make it through this. I know you’ll come back to the Light, and back to me.”

She couldn’t listen to any more of this. It was too much. Her throat felt like it had her dead sister’s claws curled around it, and her chest was burning. Because she knew how much he’d _hate _it, she tore open a void rift right in front of him and climbed through it into her tiny room below deck in _The Wind’s Redemption_.

Then, she pulled the door gently shut, carefully covered her head with as many blankets as she could gather, and _cried_five hundred years’ worth of tears. 


End file.
